


The First Time

by acosmist_t



Series: Draco Malfoy One Shots [17]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dark, F/M, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Murder, Obsessive Behavior, Possessive Behavior, yandere (?)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 18:09:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29920815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acosmist_t/pseuds/acosmist_t
Summary: She litters his thoughts, throws herself across them and leaves him begging for more. He’s obsessed, and he can’t quite seem to let her go.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Reader
Series: Draco Malfoy One Shots [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2020781
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	The First Time

**Author's Note:**

> Word Count: 3.7k
> 
> Warnings: death, obsession, dark themes, hints of alcohol abuse, toxic behaviors, more death, angst
> 
> Request: can u make me cry with a draco x reader??
> 
> a/n: i don’t know how to describe what this is. i don’t know if you’ll cry, but i’ll have other requests to do that for you. this is somewhat of a self-indulgence, and i have so much fun writing these type of fics, despite the fact that they flop. there are dark-ish themes in here and there is blatant toxic and obsessed behavior. this is in third pov, and in case you were unsure, “she” is the reader lol

It’s the first time, he thinks.

The first time that he feels that odd prickling in the pits of his stomach. The first time that it feels as though all the blood rushing through his veins pauses, stops. Retracts. Finds sanctuary in the form of an overfilled heart, brimming with pure, uninhibited jealousy.

It’s the first time that Draco Malfoy cannot manage the response he wants to give, because she cannot manage to present herself in the way that  _ he _ wants. He knows it’s wrong: to curse her for the mere expression of individual freedom. It’s so wrong.

_ Yet… _

He thinks he ought to do something about it. 

Her arm is curled around Potter’s bicep, cheek smeared across his shoulder as she laughs at something Weasley says. Probably another dimwitted remark.

Perhaps it was one at Draco’s expense.

Of course that would make her laugh.

First times are strange things. He had many firsts with her; many new beginnings that he thought would blossom into unexpected, but entirely welcomed, ends. The rushed  _ I love you _ ’s, and the paced  _ we have all the time in the world _ ’s, and maybe even the nights shrouded in shadow, where belt buckles clinked and fabric shifted over skin and the only question that mattered anymore was, “ _ do you have protection? _ ”

He did, for the record, have protection. That was the gift he had offered her; the constant preparation, more than he had held before, to be open and ready to give everything.

Misconstructions became the culprit of calamity. Because while Draco joined the Inquisitorial Squad, she joined Dumbledore’s Army. She knew his reasons as much as he knew hers, and when the initial fight boiled down, when those same reasons were still cloaked but now neglected, five words were left in their wake.

_ I can’t do this anymore _ .

—

He sees her in the halls the most.

Always with Potter.

It tinges his mind with something foreign. It creeps along his skull—a parasite, he believes it to be—and it often visits him at night. Terror was not so unknown, but sevenfold more common once he saw them.

It cuts him wide, almost like a cadaver. She and Potter are elbow-deep in his chest, a familiar Y incision opening him up to their scrutinizing eyes. They inspect his dead body, search for reasons and reactions and, like it would be a neon sign flashing across his ribs,  _ ‘Cause of Death _ ’.

He wonders what they’ll find. He wonders if her face would be posted across billboards, posters, telling passersby and every single person who couldn’t care less that  _ she _ was the cause. Maybe misconstructions weren’t the culprit. And maybe she was.

He also (dully) wonders what he looks like on the inside. She fucked him up, reordered and restructured his mind so that nothing made sense anymore. She told him he was good—imprinted the message in his frontal lobe so it was the only thing he could think of anymore. And then she changed it; then, she told him that she  _ lied _ .

No. Not that she lied. That  _ he _ was the one who  _ changed _ .

This wasn’t him. Because now he’s left questioning and inquiring and  _ wondering _ . Wondering—of course, he didn’t know—whether he did it for her.

He tells himself he didn’t. That every watchful gaze and obscene remark and action that left him hanging high and dry was for his own self. He was Draco Malfoy, after all, and that is what he knows he can always be condensed to.

He tells himself that the Inquisitorial Squad was also for himself. He didn’t  _ want _ to help her. It was a show for the sake of his blood, his name, his  _ fealty _ . It mattered not that Umbridge had been suspicious, that she had plans to catch her in corridors and drag her back to an obscure office with a not-so-quaint quill.

It was all for himself, and he would not be brought down to the level of  _ Potter _ , with another  _ misconstruction _ that he was ‘good’. Definition, the quality of being stagnant—those were not things that he wanted.

And it is because of all this, because he doesn’t like the concept that his own self wasn’t conceivable, that he proves the opposite. Suffocation was the blow she dealt unto him; removing oxygen, covering his mouth, leaving him gasping in space because he cannot understand.

He  _ misses _ her.

Because she is still curled around Potter’s bicep, and her cheek is still smeared across Potter’s shoulder, and she is still laughing at the dimwitted remark at Draco’s expense that came out of Fucking Weasley’s mouth.

_ Now _ , he wonders, _ do my insides look the same? How does my heart look? _

He’s paired with a new adornment, one in the form of a dark skull and an entrapping sense of loyalty. It resides on his left forearm, and it promises the kiss of death to anyone who takes time to question.

She would tell him, given that she is already buried deep inside his chest, his body, his creation, if he looks different. He thinks she would spare him that kindness. She and Potter.

—

It is much quieter in sixth year.

He observes, he watches, he is given tasks that ought to sour his tongue, but merely add to the  _ pain  _ in his stomach.

It’s not jealousy anymore. It’s regret, remorse, rue.

He wants her back. He wants her to want him back. He wants her to know that he knows every mistake, every break, and that he doesn’t want to make them again. He won’t.

_ Too little, too late _ , he supposes. He proved himself, that he didn’t change or mutilate or turn into someone he’s not. But determination became his enemy, as now he is stuck with a Mark he doesn’t think he wants all too much and that smarting sensation in his chest, courtesy of some infected stitches.

They say don’t live in the past, but all he can think about is exactly that. He doesn’t want to  _ move forward _ , he wants to go back. To be a child again, where the only concern was winning the House Cup, not the war that ghosts on the horizon.

And maybe he wants to go back to her. Shattering his heart was a quick process, and now the rubble only bequeaths him with the urge to undo every action. He knows it’s impossible, so that’s why he  _ makes  _ himself  _ move forward _ .

Take the Mark. Complete your tasks. Get yourself a seat beside the Dark Lord.

Be a Malfoy.

He sweeps the fragments into neat piles, places shards into a bin that shouldn’t be touched again. No glue or adhesive could reverse the mistakes that seemingly only ruined himself. Pick up the pieces, and throw them away.

Sometimes, it was better to have nothing than a smattering of something.

—

He learns he doesn’t quite like the taste of firewhisky.

He takes another sip anyway.

—

There’s this feeling he gets when the spell hits him. When he’s truly suffocating, drowning in dirty water on the bathroom floor. 

When there’s blood staining his Malfoy hair, lacerations covering his Malfoy skin, the realization of death hanging off the tip of his Malfoy tongue. He’s almost belittled, mocked because every part of him that screamed of Malfoy lineage has now been taken out of context, covered in crimson and clear and the screams of a ghost who had been his only friend for a while now.

If he were capable of it, he might’ve laughed. Because he has probably met his end—at the hand of Potter, no less—and little was left but to sit and bleed out on the wet tile. However, two things prevail in his mind: her, and his parched mouth.

His sweet melancholy. Would she say goodbye? Or would she move on to comforting Potter? He wants her to miss him, to think of him often—even at her worst, even at her best—and plague herself with notions of  _ what if _ and  _ what could have been _ . He wants her guilt and her happiness and her heartbreak and her euphoria.

He wants her to want him.

And perhaps that it is the catalyst for the second sentiment. The one that could only be sourced from his father’s own affinity for the drink. It was moments like these, where he feels as though the world is healing while he is suffering, that his fingers itch for the glass. The whole bottle.

It was moments like these that he has no preference, only the craving.

And it truly is a sick, startling thought—whilst scarlet seized all other distinctions—that she and firewhisky are hooked on the same rung of all things important. The highest rung, but the same nonetheless.

His stomach hurts again, and it is not because of the gashes carved into it.

He should’ve been better, should’ve worked  _ harder _ , so that she may never succumb to the level of a pathetic drink. And then he remembers that this is his deathbed, and wishful thinking is simply another means of torture. Prolonging the pain.

Later on, he might hold that same medium of pensive over his head. He might treat it as one would the last slice of cake—knowing they shouldn’t take it, but indulging themselves regardless. And in the end, stuck in the middleground of regret and ephemeral gratification.

But for right now, all he knows is that there is remorse overshadowing jealousy, making his heart pump  _ too _ fast. So fast, that he doesn’t think he can stop this metaphorical descent. And perhaps, he thinks he doesn’t want to.

Ah, that’s the feeling.

Satisfaction.

—

She’s there when he wakes up.

It’s shock that he feels first. Questioning if this ultimately was the afterlife—and no surprise lingers when he understands that she is his personal hell. 

There are tears in her eyes, her face swollen, her knees bouncing nervously on the seat beside his bed. She bites her lip, tugs her hair, stares down at her feet. A subconscious groan leaves his mouth, and she jumps, immediately taking a grip on his wrist.

He pulls away.

“D-Draco,” she fumbles, he blinks, “Draco, I am so, _ so _ sorry.”

The words ring true, but in his mind, they are false. She was not sorry. Not in the slightest. And as the seconds press on without a response, she does not give up.

“Are you okay? Can I get you anything?” She’s on her feet, grabbing a pitcher of water and a paper cup, filling the latter. Her fingers tremble as she hands it to him, promptly resuming her seat in the creaking plastic chair. “Your throat might hurt a bit.”

He raises an eyebrow at that, taking the cup and sitting properly against the pillows. He still doesn’t know why she’s here.

“You were screaming. In your sleep, I mean,” she answers without him asking. “Pomfrey says you were having a nightmare, or—or it might have just been pain.” She shakes her head. “Draco, are you okay?”

Repetition.

“Fine,” he says. “I’ll be fine.”

He notices that he doesn’t want her here anymore. He had learned to admire her from afar, and this proximity does not sit right with him. She’s too  _ real _ , and he feels like he’s being stabbed over and over—like ‘ _ et tu, brute? _ ’ is being whispered in his ear, his best friend the fickle fate that has stitched his future.

“Listen, Harry feels horrible. He wasn’t thinking, and he didn’t—Draco, he didn’t  _ know _ . And I understand that we’re broken up, but—but I still care about you. I don’t want you to  _ die _ .”

Her voice breaks multiple times over the course. Perhaps it was already broken—that it was a spider crack, result of one hard blow, and now everything that followed only made it multiply. It stretched across consonants and vowels, one end to another, wrapping around notions and ideas. Shattered with misconstructions.

“Oh,” is all he can manage.

She continues to coax him, begging him to comprehend the simple fact that it was a  _ mistake _ . The spell was unfamiliar, and it doesn’t matter—she grows hoarse here—because he’s fine, he’s alive, and the persistent scars are just that: scars.

No more bleeding out, no more satisfaction.

He exhales for the first time when she leaves. Then, he picks himself up, doesn’t bother to tell Pomfrey, and walks to the Room of Requirement. He may still be a part of this transitory plane, but his stay in hell decidedly does  _ not _ wait on account of his death.

There are tasks to be accomplished, after all.

—

Seventh year is a respite and a reprisal in one.

Purgatory, he decides.

She’s not there, and a knife has eased its way out of his abdomen for that fact alone. The corridors are empty, so he no longer has to observe their little display. And while the Carrows are terrible, they are infinitesimal compared to the agony Potter brought with him.

That’s the part that feels like a brutal onslaught—that while she may not be here, suffocating Draco, that meant she was with Potter. With Potter and doing whatever it is that Potter does in terms of fighting a dark wizard.

A war.

The same war that has him bumping into her all over again. He hasn’t seen her since she was dragged into Malfoy Manor by the hair, and not much has changed since. He remembers her screams, how they burst his eardrums in the present and tucked into bed beside him at night. How they did their repairs, just so that they may break him once more.

The Cruciatus was not a kind curse, and having one’s ex-lover endure it in their own home does not do much for the psyche. Other than tearing it to pieces, that is.

His regret was there, along with a million other emotions too indiscernible to count. He wanted to help her, but he also wanted her to suffer. Paradoxical. Because she harmed him—never physically—but in a way that had him reeling more than any corporeal blow. And her whimpers, sobs, shrieks only pained him more.

The cycle never ends.

He finds himself amongst the rubble, bright curses shooting at him from all directions. Fear is supposed to be taking up a spot next to his heart, making the blood thrum in his ear, concerned for his well-being. Yet there was merely adrenaline, dust kicking up behind his heels and his wand shaking with each new spell cast.

He likes war. He likes the feeling of never knowing what is to come next, and perhaps the precipice of life and death that he now wavers on. Still, he is not sure which way he’d prefer to fall.

She managed to evade him this entire time. And now he is hunting her down like a dog, organs shriveling up as he forms his course, craving only to find her. Alive. He wanted her alive.

The aftermath of his discovery, he was not quite so certain about.

A sliver of him hopes he never finds her, and that for the rest of his existence—heedless of how short it may be—he never has to see that face again. He doesn’t  _ trust _ himself enough. Turning down a new hall, his fists come up empty of answers.

He won’t hurt her. He won’t. He’ll save her.

The sound of her laugh is all he needs to be directed somewhere else. It’s desperation, what is clogging his throat, heart growing and restricting all at once. His knee buckles, and he nearly goes down, but manages to save himself as he crosses a new threshold.

He shoots a spell off that has a scream much louder than intended echoing through the destruction. There’s an uncontrollable mirth filling him, anticipation bubbling and making him rush into the library.

Oddly, he is reminded of his aunt. It’s an air of hysteria— _ insanity _ —that she carries with her; she is incorrigible, uninhibited, and a sudden kinship strikes up between the two. Now, fear prickles—still only in that tendril of apprehension—that he may have taken such dark qualities from both lines of lineage.

His lungs fail when he finds her. She had just finished fighting off a Death Eater he couldn’t be bothered with the name of when she turns her head.

Her cheeks, they’re flushed; her eyes, they’re flashing; her hand, it’s quivering.

He thinks she’s beautiful.

Beyond so.

“Draco?” she rasps, covered in soot and slowly lowering her wand arm. “Is—are—” she stutters over words she cannot find. “Who are you fighting for?”

“Darling.”

The pet name slips out, he cannot help it. He  _ knows _ her. He  _ loves _ her. He wants to  _ help _ her. Save her from this catastrophe that is their existence and fold her away like his favorite photograph inside his breast pocket.

The arm falls entirely, and she gives him a smile that has him stumbling forward. He won’t be like his aunt, he won’t, he—

“Draco, are you okay?” She won’t stop saying his name, treating it like a reminder that he doesn’t care much for. “Draco,” she says, “Draco, look at me,” she says, “Draco, put the wand down,” she says.

He hadn’t even realized he raised it in the first place.

He loves her, she is his cause and creator and cataclysm. Till the end of the world, they belong together. It was idiotic to ever think differently.

“Draco—” a crack that makes him wince, “—Draco, we’re alone. There’s no one else.” Her wand is up and her feet are trailing forward and one. hand. reaches. out.

Cups his cheek.

“Draco.” Reminder. “Draco.” Repetition. “Draco, it’s almost over.”

But ‘almost’ isn’t what he hears. It can’t be over.  _ They _ can’t be over. He won’t make it again, he refuses to, she has destroyed him too thoroughly for him to so much as—

“I love you.”

But he’s the one who says it, not her.

“I’ve loved you and I missed you and I need you—” he gasps, “— _ darling _ , I need you. You’ve—you’ve torn me apart and you can’t even apologize for it. Do you know what that’s done to me? Do you know—”

He’s rambling now, mouth  _ desperate  _ for his preferred stabilizer. And there’s anger mutilating his vision, because he no longer sees her, sees the  _ has been _ ’s and the  _ will be _ ’s. He sees red, bright and blinding and it is  _ covering _ her.

She is coated in crimson, lacking cuts but still reminiscent of his own self only a year ago. He needs to change it. Green—he loves green.

“Draco, relax. Please.” She’s begging now, one arm her savior and the other her protector as she backs away. “Please.”

“You don’t understand. We  _ belong _ together. I’ll meet you there, just like I’ve met you here and in the Great Hall and do you remember our alcove? The one just around the corner from the dungeons?”

She nods and he smiles. She doesn’t fight back.

He almost wants her to, and the sliver shrinks until it is nothing but shadow. He’s shot this curse before, he knows it, he can do it.

He’ll meet her on the other end.

“Please.” Pathetic.

“I love you,” he echos, rage whittling him down. She doesn’t know—she won’t accept it. He can’t have that. “I love you so much, and you—you  _ mock _ me.”

Someone enters the room. He can feel the Death Eater’s presence behind him, the familiar tickling on his forearm that signals proximity. He has to do this.

“Draco, it’s okay. You’re okay. Put the wand down.”

Except he can’t. And there’s this slight muttering of approval, of telling him to  _ go _ , that turns  _ him  _ into the culprit, the catalyst, the misconstruction for once. Finally, he can ruin her in retribution.

She’s still crying when he speaks, when he’s beaten down entirely. And silently, he makes the promise to follow her soon enough.

He won’t, he won’t, he’ll  _ save _ her—

“ _ Avada Kedavra! _ ”

—

Her eyes are what gloss over first. Lips parted in a familiar ‘o’, but so foreign in this context. He managed to lurch forward and grasp her hand before she fell.

It’s a soft  _ thunk _ , much gentler than he expected it to be. A slight  _ whoosh _ , but the sound of her head cracking against the hardwood reverberates in his skull.

He goes down with her.

He catches a glimpse of Rookwood, a solidification of the present as he kneels at her side. A nod in acceptance, before the Death Eater spins and stalks out of the library.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, trembling so hard that he’s frozen while a new feeling simmers in his stomach. It’s strange, unusual, and even past the point where there are cheers of celebration, it still doesn’t fade.

When he tries to extract his hand, it is more difficult than expected. She has claws for fingers, animalistic in the way she was holding on. Gruesome. Macabre.

Rigor mortis.

The new emotion steadies his heart, guides him into a trance that he doesn’t understand. A haze, he feels, lids heavy and body itching to lay down beside her. There are books surrounding them, and he wonders if their story may be contained within the ink and parchment.

He gives in and finds himself supine next to her. They’ve been in this position before, countless times, but a few things are notably missing: the rise and fall in his peripheral, the steady inhales and exhales. He entangles their fingers again, but struggles in the process, hours leaving her body cold and stiff.

Closing his eyes, he accepts this new fate. This new feeling that has taken him over, and it’s nearly laughable how the only way he could describe it is as a  _ lack _ . He has always felt too much, too saturated and unrestricted; he rarely could describe it other than a sensation of  _ too much _ .

He’s empty now, and he finds that he rather likes it. His lips are flavored with blood, and his tongue flicks over their chapped state in compensation. He doesn’t know where to go from here, but this destination seems to be perfect thus far.

His torso feels numb, deprived of oxygen or pain or joy. His fingers twitch slightly and a migraine blooms along his temples, still tasting of lidocaine. Now, he only exists.

It’s the first time, he thinks.


End file.
